The future of Windows Phone is solely dependent on how Microsoft executes its universal app strategy. If they successfully launch a way of running the same app on Windows (desktop/laptop), Phone and Tablet (non-x86) then it may be able to come back from the dead.

Unfortunately Microsoft have almost no experience at doing such a thing, they have always lived in their [big] Windows eco-system bubble and that may very well be the thing that stops Windows Phone, Windows Tablet's etc from ever becoming a real player in the market.

The next year is going to be critical to Microsoft's long term success as a platform provider outside of PCs.